


Amazing Grace

by Warp5Complex_Archivist



Category: Star Trek: Enterprise
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2006-03-07
Updated: 2006-03-07
Packaged: 2018-08-16 00:44:29
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,132
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8080153
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Warp5Complex_Archivist/pseuds/Warp5Complex_Archivist
Summary: Reed's reflections on Trip's funeral. (01/18/2003)





	

**Author's Note:**

> Note from Kylie Lee, the archivist: this story was originally archived at [Warp 5 Complex](http://fanlore.org/wiki/Warp_5_Complex), the software of which ceased to be maintained and created a security hazard. To make future maintenance and archive growth easier, I began importing its works to the AO3 as an Open Doors-approved project in August 2016. I e-mailed all creators about the move and posted announcements, but I may not have reached everyone. If you are (or know) this creator, please contact me using the e-mail address on [Warp 5 Complex collection profile](http://archiveofourown.org/collections/Warp5Complex).

Amazing Grace.

Certainly it would be Amazing Grace.

It always was Amazing Grace.

Lieutenant Malcolm Reed stared straight forward, not really seeing anything nor paying attention to his surroundings. He had dressed in his gala uniform for this 'special occasion', to honor his friend. He didn't really care for all the things that were happening around him, didn't listen to T'Pol's soft voice making the speech. T'Pol, not Archer. Jonathan Archer hadn't exactly broken down, but, well, had himself found unable to talk in front of the whole crew. Malcolm could understand him, felt sympathy for his captain. He swallowed, trying to fight the feeling down, trying to keep calm on the outside. His fingers closed around the little silver disc Archer had given him the other day.

"It has your name on it, Malcolm. Think he wants you to have it." Archer had simply said at his surprised look.

And Malcolm had listened to the voice of his friend in the solitude of his quarters the entire night.

They were honoring Trip Tucker today, his work, his selfless deed that had saved another crewman's life. His life, to be precise. The edges of the little disc pressed themselves into the flesh of Malcolm's hand.

He knew better.

Malcolm closed his eyes, his mind wandering back to the events of last week, the events that had led to the here and now.

//Alien ship. Hostility. Fired weapons. Returning fire. Winning the fight. Malcolm couldn't help grinning when thinking about it, so much it seemed to be what was called 'daily routine'. Not that he liked it, mind you. He liked firing his weapons, yes, show some of his skills he was secretly proud of. But, even if hostile, there were living beings on that other ship as well, and as much as he hated seeing one of his crewmates getting hurt, as much was he aware of the fact that on the other ship someone was standing at a tactical station as well, feeling just the same about his or hers friends as well.

The fight had been short, but serious. As soon as the other ship had beaten a retreat, Malcolm collected the damage reports. There were a lot, but as far as he could tell, it was just material, not humans. The intercom beeped.

"Tucker to bridge."

"Go ahead, Trip." He saw Archer frown.

"There's one hell of a mess down here. Could you spare Malcolm for a while, I could use another pair of hands?"

Archer nodded toward Malcolm, and he rose immediately. Though he was tactical and armory officer, he was an engineer as well, normally working with the weapons, but if necessary, quite capable of lending a helping hand in engineering. And his staff could handle the situation in the armory quite well alone, because for whatever miracle had occurred, the armory had been spared.

Pushing the heavy metal door open he understood immediately what Trip had meant. Obviously engineering had received quite a blow, debris and bended pieces of metal were lying around, smoke had filled the air, and from the scent Malcolm could tell something had burned. The engineering staff was hurrying around, trying to bring some order into the chaos. From somewhere inside a jeffreys tube, he could hear Trip call for a tool. Malcolm carefully stepped over something that could have been a railing once, protecting his face from a sudden explosion of sparkles from one of the consoles.

"My, Trip, if you wanted to redesign, why didn't you say so?"

"Mal. Good you're here." Tucker pushed himself out of the tube, jumping to his feet gracefully. The next moment Malcolm saw Trip's eyes widen in horror as he looked at something behind him. Malcolm didn't get the chance to turn around to take a look himself, when a heavy weight landed on him, knocking the wind out of him and sending him to the ground. His ears were ringing with the roar of an explosion, he felt the excessive heat of burning plasma rushing over him, heard the whirring sound of flying metal and debris. It was over in a second, running feet and swooshing sounds of fire extinguisher told him. When Malcolm was able to see again he realized the weight on top of him was a body, now stirring. Trip's body actually.

"Medical team's on its way." someone assured him. Trip Tucker looked down on him with pain glazed eyes, wheezing and coughing as he tried to breath, carefully rolling down..

"Mal..." he coughed.

"Don't speak. Phlox will be here soon."

"Never...never thought I'd...hold you in...my arms...in the end ..." Malcolm watched in growing horror as those blue eyes rolled back into Trip's head, the body getting limp in his arms. When he pulled his hand away from his friend's back it was glistening with blood.

"Oh my god..."

Phlox did his best to repair the damage done by the explosion. The blazing plasma had burned Trip's whole back and most of his legs with three-degree burns, melting the fabric of his uniform into what had remained of his skin. Bad as it was, Trip had been hit by several sharp shards and debris, most of them Phlox had been able to remove without problems. One of the bigger pieces had embedded itself into the bones of his spine, breaking three vertebras and causing lots of damage to the nerves. Phlox had fixed that damage as good as he could, mended the shattered bones and restored the function of the spinal cord in an eight hour operation, but unless Trip would wake up there was no way to tell how good actually.

Trip didn't wake up.

The second day after surgery he developed a fever. Phlox flooded his system with drugs, but as soon as the medication would wore off Trip would burn up again. The entire time Archer was sitting at his friend's side, providing silent company, talking to Trip, telling him news and rumors, or simply holding his hand every now and then. Several crewmembers would drop by to see how Trip was doing, and they would leave with concern written over their faces. T'Pol had silently taken over the bridge, aware that Archer wouldn't want to leave sickbay. And as far as there was no emergency the captain's presence wasn't required on the bridge at the moment. Malcolm dropped by in sickbay to take over when Archer needed rest himself, spending time with his best friend, reading to him, watching him, waiting. And all the time the words Trip had whispered between coughs in engineering were whirling around in his mind, not making the tiniest bit of sense.

On the fourth day Phlox had begun to look really worried and didn't even get too much sleep himself. He had set an IV the day before to get desperately needed liquids into Trip's dehydrated body. And the fever wasn't getting down.

On the fifth day Trip finally woke up.

Malcolm entered sickbay and what he saw the moment he pushed the white curtains aside made his heart skip a beat. Archer was still sitting at Trip's bed, holding his hand, but the expression on his face had changed. He was looking down on Trip, but a smile was displayed on his face. Phlox was hovering around, taking reading, preparing hyposprays, and looking not that worried as he had the last time Malcolm had paid a visit.

"Trip, good to see you again, " Archer exclaimed happily, grinning at his friend and glancing over at Malcolm.. Trip smiled faintly himself, looking around confused.

"Sickb..."

"Shhh, don't speak. Yes, you're in sickbay. Nasty little accident in engineering, you saved Malcolm's life. But you're going to be all right, Trip."

"No..." Malcolm felt something cold creep up inside him at the soft whispered word, like the premonition of something terrible that was about to happen the very next minutes. He stepped closer, made himself known to the men.

"Of course, Trip." Archer said intensely, "something like this never stopped you before."

"No...the...the abyss...is here...can see it. Now I...can sleep ..." Trip turned his head around very slowly, and Malcolm looked into intense clear blue eyes, open and sincere, everything unmistakably visible in a blink of an eye.

"Mal..." he breathed, smiling at him gently, and an odd expression of peace settled on his face. That very moment the cold feeling inside Malcolm turned into an icy grasp of fear around his heart, and he suddenly _knew_ exactly what was going on in front of his very eyes.

"Trip! Good lord, no...stay! " Again he was forced to watch helplessly as Trip's eyes rolled back, the display over his biobed starting to beep frantically when violent seizures shook the exhausted body.

"Doctor!!" Phlox was at his patient's side in no time, administering another hypospray to Trip to stop the convulsions.

Trip Tucker made it for one more day. He never regained consciousness.

And then, two days later, Archer had given him this little disc, and he had listened to it, wondering what Trip might have wanted to tell him that he felt he couldn't do in person. Malcolm listened to Trip's voice coming from the recorder, and he understood.

"Dear Malcolm, when you receive this letter ..."

Afterwards Malcolm had shakily switched off the machine, squeezed his eyes shut and felt the urgent need for a very stiff drink. For Trip's words had confirmed the feeling he had gotten in sickbay, the moment he had looked into Trip's eyes for the last time.

God, Trip, why?

The question repeated itself over and over in his mind.

Why?

Why didn't you come to me?

Why didn't you talk to me?

Why didn't you trust me...

And he didn't mind the tears slowly running down his cheeks as he grieved for the loss of a friend.//

Why?

Malcolm sighed inwardly, feeling a mixture of anger, guilt, and grieve. He closed his fingers again around the little disc, remembering every word, almost seeing Trip standing in front of him, and if he just reached out he could touch him, shake him, read him the riot act for leaving them behind. Leaving him behind. Why didn't you talk to me, Trip?

// I was afraid, Malcolm.//

Afraid of me? Bloody hell, Trip. What could I have done?

//I couldn't have stand the way you would have looked at me. We are friends, and I didn't want to lose what we already had.// So you decided you rather die than talk? You ever thought about how I might feel about _that_?!

//I...I just couldn't stand it any longer, Mal. I'm sorry...//

So you are sorry? Sneaking away the way you did? Because I know very well, though it might have been an accident, you welcomed its outcome. You could've fought, damnit. Could've stayed. But you _wanted_ to die, right?.

//Yes...it was .. the abyss, you know...I was slowly losing it, every little bit of sanity, everything that was good and warm and ...and I just couldn't...I'm sorry...//

You loved me, Trip. You said it in that letter of yours. Why didn't you just say something before to me ...

//I could see the expression in your eyes. I've seen something like it before, disgust, anger...I just didn't want to see it coming from you ...//

And you just couldn't imagine that, even if the chances were low, I could have said yes?

//No. Never.//

Right, not now, but maybe...one fine day my feelings for you could've changed. I was already feeling closer to you than to any person I've ever met before. I could have loved you back, one day, perhaps, if you just...now I will never know. Hell, we could've worked it out together, we would have find a way. Depression is treatable, Trip, for christssake.

//I'm sorry, Malcolm. Forgive me, if you can...// See, that's the point. I don't know _if_ I can. Not now.

//Farewell, my love...//

Something changed around him, something subtle, and Malcolm opened his eyes again, to be forced back into reality, only to hear a soft voice sing those words he hated more than anything else in this world..

"I once was lost / but now I'm found, / was blind but now I see..."

Lieutenant Malcolm Reed sighed, looking down on the simple black coffin covered by the official Star Fleet flag , the coffin that now held the body of Charles 'Trip' Tucker III, hero, deceased in the line of duty. But Malcolm knew better. He knew that Trip, in his own unique way, had committed suicide, by simply stopping to fight.

Because he had loved him.

Bloody hell!

Malcolm winced.

Why had it always to be Amazing Grace at funerals?

"Farewell, Trip."


End file.
